Whoa, hold on. So now I'm insulting people with OCD (or any other mental illness or chemical addiction) because I'm implying that they could just "shape up if they wanted to"? Because I asked you your opinion on the concept of free will?
If I'm wildly off base here, I apologize, but I get the distinct impression that I accidentally hit a hot button.
I didn't mean to come off as hostile. Sorry if I did. All I meant was that the notion of "free will" vis a vis independence from one's body is lent interesting new shadings in the context of someone whose brain is actively working against them. That's all. I didn't take offense at anything you said and didn't read anything accusatory into it.
Are you referring to dreams here?
No.
Let's stick with the OCD example, since I know a thing or two about it. Someone with OCD who doesn't realize it is utterly controlled by obsessive impulses. As far as they are concerned, they are exercising free will when they compulsively check the oven twelve times a day, or retrace their trip home from work twice because they think they might have hit a pedestrian.
Now, if that person realizes they have a problem, that's a new level of self-awareness. Now, they may start fighting these impulses. Now, free will has become based in conflict between "good" impulses and "bad" impulses. However, the person may not understand (or care) which impulses represent "free will", if any.
Taken further, if that person receives successful treatment, they will understand that chemical imbalances in the brain are responsible for their obsessions and compulsions. Yet another new level of self-awareness. What the person now confronts is the "free will" of their consciousness dealing with the faulty impulses parts of their brain is sending. What was once a person's "will" is now set in opposition to that "will." Accepting and dismissing that "other will" is the key to effectively living with OCD. (However, IMO, this new "free will" is no more independent of the brain than the previous perception of "free will.")
That's what I mean by different levels of self-awareness. Defining "free will" is difficult because not everyone perceives the same thing as "free will." In any event, it's impossible to say objectively whether "free will" is an illusion because we cannot objectively assess it. We are *in* it. It's great fodder for philosophers. Personally, I think it's all biology. But I'm a killjoy when it comes to such things.
In other words, "this process is so complicated, I can't see any pattern. Therefore, it must be random."
What Patrick said. Just because something isn't random doesn't necessarily mean that it's predictable.
Ryan